Half-Life
by The Cheshire Cheese
Summary: Tag to "Deadlock." Harry isn't alone; B'Elanna knows how it feels to lose your "other half."


**A/N: This is set directly after "Deadlock."**

 **I don't own "Star Trek: Voyager."**

* * *

It was like waking from a nightmare, that soaring feeling of an iron weight flying off one's chest with the realization that it was only a dream. B'Elanna had experienced this feeling plenty of times on Voyager and in the Maquis, following the close scrapes where, somehow, they'd miraculously come out with everything relatively back to normal. But she couldn't recall the last time she'd experienced the feeling to this degree.

 _Harry's alive._

Granted, it wasn't "her" Harry. He was still dead, his body probably miles from Voyager by now, and mutilated beyond recognition from the exposure to space. It made her nauseated to think about what her friend's last moments had been like. But that wasn't Harry, she told herself, not all of him at least. Just like the Klingon who died saving her wasn't _entirely_ B'Elanna Torres.

Just seeing him on the other Voyager, through the comm. link, that was a feeling only comparable to that moment when, during a night terror, you realized you were dreaming. That none of this was real. Of course _technically_ this was all real; but seeing the mirrors of herself and the rest of the crew, of Harry, had comforted her with the knowledge that they _hadn't_ entirely lost Harry or Sam's baby, that what they'd just been through hadn't been what it seemed.

It had been from Engineering that Captain Janeway and her counterpart discussed the ultimate solution, when the other Voyager was boarded by the Vidiians. The sickening feeling that the counterparts of all B'Elanna's comrades, and herself, were about to die, was overwhelmed with the excitement of having Harry back. What had followed were the five longest minutes of B'Elanna's life, as she and Tuvok waited for Harry to come through the rift with the baby. When he did B'Elanna, being B'Elanna, had simply replied dryly, over folded arms, "It's about time."

B'Elanna had been facing traumatic situations for years, and was starting to get used to bizarre ones now too. Her reasons for dissecting her reactions on this incident went far beyond simple reflection.

It was now past 0300 hours. Having just finished her extended, exhausting shift on Engineering, she would normally run straight to her quarters and collapse into bed without even changing. But tonight, as soon as B'Elanna exited Engineering, she hit her combadge and said breathlessly, "Computer, locate Harry Kim."

" _Ensign Kim is on Holodeck-2."_

She hurried to the holodeck, vaguely entertaining the idea of asking Harry over the comm if he minded her joining him. It was generally frowned on to use your combadge for personal calls (something she, Chakotay and Ayala had had to quickly communicate to their Maquis comrades who weren't former Starfleet officers). She decided to simply surprise him.

When she reached the holodeck she was surprised to find it locked, but being the chief engineer B'Elanna had no trouble overriding Harry's codes. The doors hissed opened to reveal Sandrine's. Harry was leaning over the counter, deep in a conversation with the bar's holographic owner. From his flushed complexion, B'Elanna guessed the drink on his hand was not holographic. (If one wanted to consume real food or alcohol on the holodeck, they needed only select the option to have the computer take it out of their replicator rations.) And then there was the fact that Harry apparently hadn't heard the doors open, and didn't notice B'Elanna standing in the restaurant's doorway. In his defense, Sandrine was playing some rather loud French music.

"My shipmates are all dead," Harry slurred. "My best friend is dead. I passed Tom's body in the corridor, I could see him sagging because they'd beamed out all his organs. I saw Kes and Sam's bodies on sickbay. And I had a quick chat with the Doctor, before leaving him there to be destroyed with the rest of the ship. I'm gonna spend the rest of my life wondering how the rest of them died. And how _I_ died."

"No one told you?" B'Elanna folded her arms.

Both Harry and Sandrine's heads turned.

Harry squinted drunkenly at her. " _B'Elanna_? How'd you get in here?"

Gaunt Gary, the mobster character Tom had created to "liven up" the program, grinned from the pool table, flashing a row of putrid formations that could only be called "teeth" because of the space they occupied in his mouth. "Lana, baby! Are we a lady or a tramp tonight?"

The punch she delivered was a flimsy one, for B'Elanna at least. Her face showed no Klingon rage; she wore a calculating expression as she hit Gaunt Gary, like she would when lining up a pool shot. She watched with disappointment as he merely tumbled back onto the pool table, scattering balls.

"Damn," she sighed. "Still haven't got it back." Turning to Harry she said, "When I hit Carrey last year, he went clean over the railing and into the warp core."

Harry squinted as he worked out what she was saying. "You mean he smacked _against_ the warp core."

"Well yeah."

Gaunt Gary was stumbling back to a stance, and Sandrine was cursing to herself in French. With a sigh, B'Elanna said, "Computer, freeze program."

Now the only moving things in Sandrine's were B'Elanna and Harry. "Sorry to intrude Harry."

"No, it's fine."

B'Elanna weaved her arms back into their signature fold. "I just wanted to see if you were okay."

Harry scoffed and shrugged. "I haven't been dissected. Or disintegrated."

"Or blown into space." B'Elanna said flatly.

Harry's face changed. "So that's how I—I mean my counterpart—died."

"I was there." B'Elanna gaped silently as she searched for the words. "I tried to grab your hand. I _did_ grab it, but, but I wasn't strong enough."

"W—" Harry hesitated. "What was my face like? Was I…did I look like I was accepting it, or…?"

After a moment she said, "You looked scared." With along sigh, she placed her hands on the table behind her. "I had to notify the Bridge."

"That must've been hard."

"I'm used to losing friends." After a moment she added, "So's Tom."

And then came the memory she'd been doing her best to repress for the last day or so. For some reason, the words she'd exchanged with Tom was one of the most uncomfortable parts of this entire incident. They'd been in Engineering, the "temporary bridge" after the usual one had rendered inhabitable. She and Tom had somehow wound up alone in a corner on the upper level, and inevitably were discussing Harry's death.

"You're feeling guilty, aren't you," Tom had said.

B'Elanna had looked at him.

"About Harry. I know the feeling, I killed three of my best friends at Caldik Prime."

B'Elanna turned away. "I lose friends all the time. Or did, back in the Maquis."

Tom nodded. "I know, I remember."

Their time on the Val Jean together had been brief. B'Elanna hadn't thought much of Tom back then. She liked to think she didn't think too much of him now, though truth be told he'd been earning her respect. But that didn't mean she had to swoon under his flyboy schtick like every other female he'd womanized.

"It sucks," Tom said. "I'd gotten to thinking, _this time,_ this time I'm gonna take care of my friend. Not repeat Caldik Prime."

B'Elanna leaned over the consol. "I know the feeling." Staring at her hands, she said, "After Seska…I thought I was done trying to find a friend I could trust." She shrugged, "Alright, I trusted Chakotay, Captain Janeway. But not like, not like a friend your own age, who isn't your commanding officer." Tom was watching her sympathetically. "Why I wasn't affected by Seska's betrayal as badly as Chakotay—well a lot of it is my Klingon physiology taking it's damn sweet time to fully return after what that Vidiian freak did to me—but it was also having _Harry_ there. I hadn't lost my best friend, not really. And now he's," she realized tears were streaming down her face.

Tom hesitantly reached over to put his arm around her. She'd shrugged him off, and hurried away.

* * *

"You're my best friend Harry," B'Elanna shook her head. "I know _your_ best friend is Tom. I don't mean it in a competitive, grade-school kind of way. I just mean…after Seska turned out to be a Cardassian, and Chakotay in no shape to counsel anyone, I don't know what I'd have done without you being there."

"I'm just surprised _you_ weren't the one stealing that shuttle, going after Seska," Harry said.

B'Elanna sighed inwardly. "After that Vidiian scientist split me in half, my Klingon counterpart died saving me—the weak, weepy human. The Doctor used her DNA to return me to normal, but the insides are taking longer than out." Her brown eyes met Harry's. "I haven't been myself since then. I guess I should be grateful, having that anger out of the way so I can do my job. If the 'real' B'Elanna had been working on Dreadnaught, I'd probably have punched a few bulkheads before being able to focus on any of my work. Who knows if I'd even still have my job as chief engineer."

"You got that job right after breaking Carrey's nose," Harry reminded her. "Obviously ability trumps professionalism, at least in Captain Janeway's book. Anyway, you always seemed to function better, after you'd let off some steam."

B'Elanna whispered with a bitter smile, "What the hell was wrong with me, that time I suggested allying with Seska in the briefing room?"

Harry shrugged. "It was a suggestion. I was impressed you were past it enough not to be bothered about her anymore."

"But _in front of_ _Chakotay_. After what she did to him. I was crying about him, Harry, when she took him prisoner. And I cried again after that little 'announcement' she made. Half the time, since the split, I've just been on the verge of tears, and the other half I feel higher than a class of first-year cadets on Romulan crystals." B'Elanna rolled her eyes. "I have gotten _so_ far off the subject. I _had_ a point, you know. The point is, I know what it's like to lose your 'other half.' Twice."

"I guess the whole crew lost a 'half' tonight," Harry took another swig from his drink. "Or is it 'last night' already?"

"I know all about the existential crisis," B'Elanna continued. "'Am I really B'Elanna,' 'Am I really Harry?' Or am I just a pathetic copy of a dead woman? Where's the other B'Elanna's soul now? Did it transfer back into me and remerge, or is she in Grethor waiting for me to join her?"

Harry was nodding. "Well not the 'Grethor' part, but the rest. I've been wondering the exact same thing, about, about the souls. I was never particularly religious or anything, but I've wondered about the afterlife plenty of times. Especially after the first time I died."

"I never gave it a single thought," B'Elanna said. "Not until I saw my other half die."

"Oh god," Harry swayed drunkenly, "there's only one-fourth of the original B'Elanna left."

"And maybe that's a good thing," B'Elanna said quietly.

"Hey!" Harry staggered to a full stance. "There's no way in hell we'd have made it out of the Ocampan city without you. How many times would Voyager be destroyed without you holding it together? There's a reason Captain Janeway picked you over Carrey. Where would Chakotay be, after what Seska did to him?"

"I can't believe that Cardassian _p'tach_ is carrying his child," B'Elanna cringed.

"God," Harry whispered. "What Sam must be going through right now."

"Someday," B'Elanna realized, "She's gonna have to tell that kid…tell her the truth."

"We'll tell her what you just told me right now," Harry decided. "Everyone on the ship lost a counterpart. At least they got the pleasure of seeing the Vidiians go down with them."

"The ones that lived long enough you mean." B'Elanna swallowed. "She had to see Vidiians _again_. And be killed by them."

It took Harry a moment to realize that B'Elanna was talking about her counterpart on the doomed Voyager.

"She probably put up an impressive fight," Harry assured her.

B'Elanna glanced at him, then at the holographic mobster frozen in mid-stagger. "I just wonder… _did_ they just kill me? Or did they try taking me back to the lab for more experiments?"

"Well they didn't get far," Harry assured her.

B'Elanna's jaw clenched. "I just hope to god she lived to see the bastards around her go up in flames."

Harry said nothing. Most everyone he'd run past had been dead, or maybe unconscious (which was being optimistic).

"It's like you said, about Seska," Harry shrugged, "We have to just…put it behind us. Move forward, towards the Alpha Quadrant. Hey," he tried lamely, "We'll have some interesting stories to tell everyone when we get back home." B'Elanna didn't offer much of a response, and Harry knew that she was one of the crewmembers more cynical about their ever reaching home. Trying a different tactic, he said, "You _are_ starting to seem more like the B'Elanna I met on Ocampa lately, if it's any consolation."

B'Elanna flexed her fist in front of her. "I think you're right… why are you trying to cheer _me_ up? I came here to check up on _you_."

Harry shrugged. "Wanna go a few rounds at pool? Or maybe just get drunk?"

B'Elanna gave it some thought. "Drunk sounds good. Computer, route B'Elanna Torres' replicator rations to the holodeck. And resume program."

Gaunt Gary resumed his stagger, and B'Elanna whirled around with a punch that sent both him and the pool table straight to the ground. She admired her work with her hands on her hips, while Harry lifted his glass in congratulations.

Sandrine was ranting in French again.

* * *

 **A/N: If you're interested in seeing Naomi learn about the events of "Deadlock," look into my ficlett "Duplicate."**

 **I also highly recommend "Vignettes featuring Ro Laren," by Loki's Son. Chronicling Ro's time with the Maquis, this series of one-shots features some brilliant crossovers of TNG with DS9 and Voyager. I haven't read the entire collection yet (busy as usual) but the three chapters I did read were mind-blowing.**

 **On a final note, Robert Beltran is set to reprise his role as Chakotay in the next installment of "Star Trek: Renegades!" Jake Sisko will also be appearing, and actress Terry Ferrell, though we don't know yet if she'll be playing Jadzia Dax or someone else. To say I'm growing impatient for episode two is an understatement.**

 **I hope to have "The Conspirators" updated soon, and/or one of the other short stories I've been working on. I could blame my work schedule again, but it's finally occurred to me that my work schedule is** _ **always**_ **wonky.**


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